Pity the customs official who needs to deal with Peter when he crosses a border by car. His documents can be rather confusing, if not downright suspicious: his car has an Austrian license plate; he holds a Swiss passport, but it shows that his residence is in Hong Kong; as for his driving license, take your pick: two from China, one from the U.S., or several others; and his miniature laminated marriage certificate says that his Malaysian-Chinese wife is Australian.
When he was a lot younger, he raced for four years automobiles in Europe (Formula 2, Formula 3, Formula Super-V and Renault Elf), on occasion even successfully: in 1980, the British motoring magazine Autosport titled an article about Peter’s pole position and win in Silverstone ‘A Star is Born’.
A series of chance events then led Peter to study I.T. at M.I.T., business at INSEAD and Japanese and Mandarin at Harvard. He got his taste of corporate life at Accenture where he painfully heaved himself up to become an associate partner in the consultancy’s China practice.
His passion for driving has never left him, however. In 2003, he said good-bye to the corporate world and began to devote himself to a career that had, once again, all things driving at its heart. In 2005, this resulted in a book that BBC Radio called a love letter to the pleasures of being on an open road: On the Road – Driving Adventures, Pleasures and Discoveries.
Having driven over the years a million-plus kilometers on roads in Europe, the U.S. and Asia, and loving every moment of it, he nowadays quenches his thirst for driving by taking to the roads of China. The upshot was On the Road Experiences, a company that offers crafted road journeys in Asia and Europe.
In the year 2007, he realized a dream: Nokia sponsored him to go on a 21,000km journey through China in the granddaughter of the famed 1950s Lotus 7. From Shanghai, China’s hippest city, to the Tibetan highlands where all he saw was a yak. When he got out of his driver’s seat three-and-a-half months later, his Lotus was auctioned off at a gala charity event hosted by Yao Ming. Nokia donated the proceeds to the China Youth Development Foundation.
Peter’s circuitous life journey and adventures on the highways and byways of the world is the subject of many speaking engagements. He has inspired audiences at events hosted by diverse organizers such the Royal Geographical Society, TEDx, and corporations such as Accenture.
Peter resonates most with Ralf Waldo Emerson’s immortal phrase: Don’t go where there is a path; go instead where there is no path and leave behind a trail.